


Original Statement of Gerard Keay?

by Aka_Mel



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Archivist Gerard Keay, Flirting, Fluff, Friendship / Flirting / Thinking of You Fest, Human Michael Shelley, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M, Mentioned Mary Keay, Original Statement (The Magnus Archives), Sad Gerard Keay, Spoilers up to TMA 111, Statement Fic (The Magnus Archives)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-26
Updated: 2021-01-26
Packaged: 2021-03-18 16:15:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,848
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28995078
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aka_Mel/pseuds/Aka_Mel
Summary: Michael asked Gerard if he might want to give his statement for the record and though he's refused Gertrude so many times--he can't seem to say no to the tall, giggling blond archival assistant. Even if remembering his mother makes him want to vomit or burn something, but being around Michael is...nice.||SPOILERS UP TO TMA 111||
Relationships: Gerard Keay/Michael Shelley
Kudos: 20





	Original Statement of Gerard Keay?

Noise. Noise. Noise. Noise. Noise

Noise. Noise. Noise. Noise

Noise. Nose, nOise.

nlskdjfslhdfal;jsdkfalsjdf;alsjdfljdflsjfa dfahskdfjasdkljf;alsjdfl;asd ahdfasdjafl;jsdasdlkfjasldkjfa;l sdal;sjfasdh fa;ldklaj;dkl aljdfasklfjdljfaljfd;

Gerard Keay never felt rest. 

His mother would come in and tell him about a new power she had discovered. A new Jurgen Leitner book she had found. Another thing about their legacy. How powerful their bloodline was. How it would serve to bring them closer to them. 

It was always too much. Every. Single. Time.

And every time he had a moment to himself, it was always disturbed soon after by his mother. 

And every time she pressed upon him another one of her theories or obsession--his need for escape, for recovery, for breath was longer and longer and longer to obtain. 

Most times he thought an hour to himself was enough. The few hours he got at whatever school he was at that quarter for however long he could stand to be there before he skipped or she pulled him out again.

It was never enough...

Not one hour or minute. Not one place. Not one instance of peace was ever enough. He never had enough time to recover himself. To find peace.

"Even after--" he grunted and kicked the chair empty on the side of the table from him, "SHE WAS IN A FUCKING BOOK!" 

"I--I'm sorry," the creaky, giggly voice cut through his mental fog." "She was what?"

He never liked his name. Gerard Keay. Was what his mum always called him. Always an extra emphasis on their last name, like it was important. The Powers out there didn't care about blood. Gerard knew that. 

He always wanted to be called 'Gerry.'

Gerry looked up from the desk he was leaned over. The crick in his neck now obvious but he tried not to show it, tried to look cool and collected in front of the cute and awkward archival assistant in front of him. Although...he probably lost a lot of face in front of Michael Shelley since the start of his statement.

"She..." Gerry growled under his breath, wanting to get it out quickly and be done with it. "My mum found out how to live after death by skinning herself and putting it into a book or whatever. You've heard of Jurgen Leitner, right?"

"Aaaah," Michael said and exhaled at the same time, "I think? Gertrude's asked me to pull any of the statements with that name attached before but she never really said much else."

Gerry flicked one eyebrow up, telling himself to note it to himself. "Hm."

"Anyway!" Michael piped up, almost jolting himself as he motioned to Gerry to continue, "You were saying? Your mother--"

"Yeah, well, she half succeeded. She wasn't really still all there. But she was there enough to keep on nagging me."

Gerard's mind seized from the memory of all her sharp words.

Why didn't you stay???

Why didn't you help me finish???

I wouldn't have to follow you around and beg you like this if you had JUST. STAYED. GERARD.

You were always useless!

As useless as your father! 

That's why I had to get rid of him--

If you didn't have our lineage in your veins I would have done the same to y--

"Gerard?" the giggling voice said, a strain there so subtle you might miss it. But Gerard Keay never missed that kind of beat. "Are you okay?"

Gerry looked up again, not realizing he had looked away at all. The kindness in Michael's eyes was unreal. How could a person with that much leg on him look so. damn. fragile. How could someone that soft even come to work at the infamous Magnus Institute. 

What fucked up thing had he seen to land him here?

At least Gerard Keay looked and acted as fucked up as the things he had seen.

Well...he hoped he was better than what he had been raised into. He fucking hoped he was. He would never be a saint but he hoped he was at least better than his mother and that damn Jurgen Leitner. 

Gerry was doing at least one thing his mother would never do. Work for The Magnus Institute. Work for whatever Power reigned over it that his mother refused to even speak about. Although...was working for this place any better? How could he possibly be any better a person for working here--just because it was opposite to his mother?

"Gerard?" Michael asked again. His brows raising in real, outright concern now.

Gerry. His mind begged, but he would not ask out loud. He bit the feeling down.

"W-we could, haha, always take a tea break? Or start again another day?" Michael laughed, his half laughs were breathy and tapered at the end like he were laughing at himself. It was cute. Then his strained smile dropped and he looked across the table at Gerard like a begging puppy. 

He wanted to say something.

Gerry kept his mouth shut, waiting, watching.

"Haha!" Michael gulped. "I..I kn-know what it's like...giving a statement."

Gerry lifted his eyebrows like he were surprised but he wasn't, this was the Magnus Institute after all.

"It's pretty exhausting. Don't know why, but it is. As if...as if you're laying out your soul to--to..." he trailed off, his eyes trailing to look over Gerry for some reason and Gerry didn't feel all that comfortable himself anymore. 

He quickly looked over his shoulder but there was nothing there. Just the door out of the office they were currently in. Unless...

"W-well, it's always exhausting, hahaha...haa. So I'd understand if you wanted to stop?"

He gestured a lot too. Gerry noticed. And whenever he did he drew attention to all the paper cuts he had on his hands. Gerry knew they were just paper cuts. He knew what a proper knife cut looked like. 

Considering Michael had now just dropped his pencil for the fifth time since they sat down and all the times he dropped something on their walk over for Gerry to give his statement. He just had to conclude that Michael was a klutz.

Again. Cute.

It gave Gerry.... Courage was the farthest word to describe Gerard Keay, but it gave him something so he could continue. 

"It's fine. Just...new to this whole...talking about it thing. It was always just me and my mum for the longest time." Gerry shrugged and gave a thick false smile. "And of course, she was the 'let's talk our feelings out' sort. So...kind of new...talking about any of this...to anyone, really."

Michael chuckled, his innocent smile returning and giving Gerry a boost of something nice in his chest. "Yeah, I can understand that..." He paused and stopped himself, practically jumping to correct himself. "No! I mean! I don't understand your situation. What you went through--i-it was horrible and so much more than any child should have had to and I don't mean to sound frivolous about your life I only meant--meant--oh dear..."

His eyes were practically spiraling and he was much too flushed to be considered healthy.

Gerry couldn't keep back his laugh, a small pft escaped around his hand as he tried to cover it.

"Yeah, I get it," Gerry said with a smile. "Things get weird. And how do you deal with the weird? Well, first visceral thing is probably being scared shitless and no matter how much time passes the fear never really leaves. So you feed it. Seek it out. As if, finding more of the weird makes you feel safer than always wondering when it'll next pop up and you find yourself giving a statement."

Michael blinked a few times, very still, very thoughtful, but all that came out of him was, "Oh..."

"Too much?" Gerry rocked back on the chair.

"No, no, it was just...Hm...We got off topic?"

"Suppose we did."

Gerry didn't elaborate or continue, just smiled at Michael. He watched the poor straw man wiggle.

"So! After your mother...uhm..."

"Skinned herself and trapped herself in a book. Yeah?"

"What...did you do?"

"Nothing really. Tried to get rid of her. But somehow she was able to follow me...heh...was getting pretty desperate at the time. That's when I met Gertrude."

Michael's eyes lit up. Gerry stared, why did Michael's eyes light up at the mention of that old woman's name?

"And?" he asked, giggly.

"Well...she said she knew about Leitner books, part of the Magnus Institute and blah blah blah. Said she could look into it."

"And she discovered how to release your mother, didn't she?"

Gerry chuckled, "Am I still giving my statement?"

"Oh! Sorry, sorry! It's just--" he beamed, as if proud of his own grandmother. "Gertrude's amazing, isn't she?"

"Yeah, guess if you need a book exorcized of your mother. She's the person to go to."

"She's so smart. Knows all these things I wish I'd known years ago!" he went on. "But...she's so frail. She can't do as much as she wants and it worries me she'll go too far."

Considering Gertrude had kept the book that had once held Mary Keay and had yet to mention returning it or even at all to Gerry, told him enough that that woman could definitely, probably already has, gone too far. He just didn't care as long as those things were stopped. 

Right?

His mother worked tirelessly to seek out the Powers out there. If he worked at the Magnus Institute, with Gertrude Robinson, to stop whatever they were then that was a good thing, right?

He planned to be wary of Gertrude Robinson, but he didn't plan on calling out her questionable methods. 

"Haha! Sorry. We're not here to talk about my statement--"

"Aah, I don't see why not?" Gerry said. "A statement's a statement, right? That's what this place cares about. So! What's your statement, Michael Shelley?"

"Oh--uhm--"

"I hope that's not office gossip I hear back here? Oh." Gertrude opened the door to the small office to find Gerry leaning on his chair like some nonchalant schoolboy and Michael on the other side of the table looking like teacher's pet caught doing something questionable. 

"Gertrude!" Michael cried out.

She ignored Michael and looked down at the goth with his boot on her desk. "Are you finally giving us your statement?"

"Yeah, well, research got boring," Gerry replied.

"I see." She looked up at Michael. "And were you taking his statement for me?"

"Y-yes! I thought it might save you the time if I just--" he chocked at the last word. 

Gerry looked up at Michael's face, not paled but quietly panicked. As if he had done something wrong and teacher was about to scold him for it. Gerry followed Michael's gaze at the tape recorder on the desk to the side, out of immediate view of either of them. 

It was turned off.

Michael's laugh was breathy and weak, squeaked at the end.

"Oh. Oh no."

**Author's Note:**

> Wrote this to vent out some depression in a fugue despite not having caught up in TMA yet. It wasn't going anywhere else so I thought why not throw it into the AO3 void too. Also I just...LOVE...these two good beans SO MUCH. I have so much pent up feels for The Magnus Archives and all the characters, come cry with me how so many of them deserved better T-T


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